10 November 2005

Warwick Wright's decision to postpone his upcoming trip to Hawaii paid big dividends at the Quiksilver Goodwave in Durban on Wednesday when the 21-year-old Durbanite surfed away with first place and pockets full of money to the tune of R60 000.

Wright, who competes on the ASP World Tour, was due to travel to Hawaii on Tuesday for the Triple Crown of Surfing on the North Shore of Oahu, but decided at the last minute to compete in the Goodwave.

Wright triumphed over a field of 32 invited surfers who pulled out all the stops in a sensational showdown held in gigantic two to three metre storm surf along the Durban beachfront.

Assisted by jet skis
Due to high seas and storm surf pounding the coastline for two days lifeguards riding jet skis assisted in towing surfers to the backline after each wave they caught during the 30-minute final.

"I'm so bad at making speeches, but I don't care because I am the one now with 60 big ones," joked Wright at the Goodwave prize giving ceremony.

"I really wasn't sure if I was going to pull it off because the vibe was really heavy in the water towards the end, because there was so much money at stake.

"Quiksilver made a great call running the event today. I'm going to save the money and put it towards buying a house," said Wright, who was surfing on a board he borrowed from best friend and World Championship Tour surfer Travis Logie.

Slow start
The all important final was off to a slow start with the surfers' nerves wreaking havoc with their initial performances. Wright was the first to throw down the gauntlet with a credible 6.5 out of a possible 10 points. Thereafter a battle between goofy-foot surfers ensued with Paul Canning (Durban) replying with a superb succession of three powerful turns which earned him 7.25 points.

Event standout Sean Holmes (Jeffrey's Bay) came alive with a score of 7.85 points to knock Canning down to third.

Damien Fahrenfort, who moved from Cape Town to live in Durban earlier in the year, did not manage to get the pick of the waves on offer and was unfortunate to be stuck on the jet ski for an unusually long time; he placed fourth. In the dying minutes of the heat Wright used well thought-out tactics to prevent Holmes from threatening his victory.

Globally unique event
The Quiksilver Goodwave is a globally unique event and stemmed from the idea to hold a core event for surfers, putting money back into their careers.

The Quiksilver Goodwave had a window period running from 31 January to 31 December and was run on the single best surfing day of the year, which was monitored by swell forecasting guru Steve Pike. The contest boasted a total prize purse of R125 000.

Dane Patterson from Quiksilver said: "We are really pleased about the way the whole event went down, the surfing was unreal. The conditions were testing but enabled some of the big names to explode in the powerful waves. We are stoked to be able to put on such a unique event and put the money back into the surfers."

Quiksilver Goodwave Results

Final

	Quiksilver Goodwave 2005 winner Warwick Wright rips into a wave

	SA juniors outsurf the best Watersports in South Africa Sun, surf & golf

	Quiksilver Goodwave 2005  Wavescape  ASP Africa  Tostee.com